State stem cell initiative transforms local research

Nearly seven years ago, California voters approved the state's
landmark stem cell research program. Taxpayers funded $6 billion in
state bonds for the program under
Proposition 71
. After interest, that left $3 billion to advance
stem cell research from the lab to patients.

Critics point to a lack of treatments developed under the
program, officially called the California Institute for
Regenerative Medicine, or CIRM. The bright hopes of quick cures
didn't materialize.
High
salaries paid to program officials
and conflict of interest
allegations have sparked repeated controversy.

In San Diego County, one of the country's top three centers of
biomedicine, researchers say CIRM has greatly boosted stem cell
science's profile and magnitude. That commitment is producing
advances that will translate into patient health and an economic
boost for the local life sciences industry, they say.

As of Aug. 26, the program had granted a total of $266 million
to researchers in San Diego County, along with $6.1 million to
those at UC Riverside.
A total of $1.25 billion
has been granted statewide under the
10-year program, approved by voters in 2004.

The building is run by a joint project of the four institutions,
the
Sanford Consortium
for Regenerative Medicine
. Although all four are close together
on Torrey Pines Mesa, stem cell scientists say working together in
the same building will stimulate the kind of interaction and
serendipity that sparks ideas.

Moving in

Robert
Wechsler-Reya
, director of Sanford-Burnham's tumor development
center, says he plans to move his laboratory into the new building.
He arrived last year from Duke University in North Carolina after
receiving
a $5.9 million Leadership Award
from CIRM to support his
research, the first scientist to receive the award. Wechsler-Reya
studies the link between stem cells and tumor formation.

Wechsler-Reya says he has some mixed feelings about the move,
because he likes his present environment so much.

"I just arrived on Sanford-Burnham's campus, and I really like
interacting with the colleagues here," he said. "So we're trying to
figure out what's going to be the best space for us long term.
There's some terrific colleagues who are moving into that building,
and some unique resources there. It'll be a nexus for stem cell
research on the mesa."

Wechsler-Reya had been at Duke for nearly a
decade
.
After receiving tenure, he thought hard
about what the next phase of his career would entail. His wife and
fellow scientist,
Tannishtha
Reya
, decided San Diego was the best move.

"It seemed like this is a really great opportunity to do
something new, exciting and fun," he said.

Other considerations included San Diego's famously salubrious
weather and the couple's desire to find an appropriate place to
raise their young children.

Kristiina
Vuori
, Sanford-Burnham's president, said the institute and UCSD
collaborated to bring the couple to San Diego. They nominated
Wechsler-Reya for the CIRM award. UCSD hired Reya, his wife, as a
professor of pharmacology at the university's biomedical sciences
graduate program.

Catalyst

Over at the Salk Institute, veteran researcher Inder Verma says
the state program catalyzed the institute's involvement with stem
cell research. The program paid for a shared laboratory at Salk
devoted to stem cell technology. This "
stem cell core facility
"
provides training and equipment for scientists interested in
working with stem cells.

The core facility was especially important for those working
with human embryonic stem cells, because of federal restrictions
imposed by President Bush in 2001 on the use of its money for that
research, Verma said. President Barack Obama relaxed those
restrictions after taking office in 2009. The facility also works
with artificial embryonic stem cells called IPS, or induced
pluripotent stem cells, which are typically grown from skin cells
called fibroblasts.

"Many people at the Salk wanted to work in this area, but they
didn't know where to start, because they didn't have access to
these cells, they didn't have access to the technology," Verma
said. "But once we had a core facility, suddenly, a large number of
labs, 16 to 17, began to do work in the area of regenerative
medicine. My lab had almost no one working on stem cells, and now,
there are six to eight people working on stem cells."

Verma's own research, which specializes in genetics, has
incorporated stem cell technology. He's a longtime proponent of
gene therapy, which involves using genes to correct genetic
disorders. Verma's strategy is to grow IPS cells from a patient
with a genetic disease such as hemophila, insert a working copy of
the faulty gene, then convert them into the proper tissue type and
transplant into the patient.

Serving its purpose

John Simpson, a spokesman for the group
Consumer Watchdog
, said that
despite mistakes, the stem cell program has largely achieved its
purpose of advancing stem cell research for medical applications.
Simpson has criticized the group for a lack of transparency and
conflicts of interest.

"The problem is, frankly, that they oversold expectations during
Prop. 71," Simpson said. "So everyone's running around saying, 'Why
aren't there cures yet?' The scientists I think were realistic, but
the political establishment sold the expectation that if you simply
pass Proposition 71, we'd be having stem cell cures in a year or
so. And that wasn't going to happen."

Simpson said there have been encouraging signs, such as the
recent enrollment of a Californian in a clinical trial of a spinal
cord injury therapy developed in part through the program, the
first time a California patient has received program-derived stem
cell treatment.

The proper course now is to wean the researchers off of state
money as it's depleted, and let the agency close down after its
10-year lifespan has passed, Simpson said. But that may not happen,
because the agency's supporters want to keep the program going.

"I think they are repositioning themselves to go back for
another bond issue and keep CIRM going," Simpson said. "We've
already put what's going to be $6 billion of taxpayer money into
the project. I do not think they should go back to the public and
ask for more money, particularly given the state of California's
economy."